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Letters to the Editor
*The 1-AA national football titles of 1999 and 2000 were just a handful of years ago, but it feels more like 20. The calendar year of 2006 alone added lines on the face, and gray hairs to old and young alike in the Eagle nation. Losing the beloved Erk Russell on the eve of the program’s worst season ever was the biggest of all the losses. *The strong play and regular season finishes at or near the top of the Southern conference standings (earlier this decade) in basketball have lost their luster, despite a solid campaign in 2005-2006. 2006-2007 was a big disappointment. *The Baseball team took a swing at the ’07 season. But due to inconsistency, and the inability to keep up with the “Jones’s” of SoCon competition, they eventually struck out. And while every baseball team has periods of inconsistency, several of the former GSU clubs (5 to 10 years ago) found a way into the postseason…shaking off the conference competition. They found a groove late in the season, but not when it mattered most as they were once again dismissed from the conference tournament, and the bats and gloves were routinely put away until next year. A shift of powers has generally transpired in the Southern Conference concerning Georgia Southern and these three main sports programs---a power that GSU once held in years prior when it truly was “Southern’s conference”. The Eagle nation is growing restless and weary. Perhaps there is a way to get back that “feared” and dominant edge that has been lost. Let’s take a deeper look at these programs, beginning alphabetically. Baseball The 'baseball love' of mid February is now months in the rear-view. There was a huge meltdown between Feb. 20th and April 20th. From that point on, the bats and the arms woke up a bit. In the earliest drafts of this article (April 13th), the Eagles had managed to eek out a mere 2 wins in conference play, and looked hard pressed to finish above .500 in either category. Eventually, things turned around from late April through early May, and a 10-game win streak ensued, which was a good thing and a nice shot in the arm for Eagle baseball. Not to be a party-pooper, but the question in my mind was ---‘will it last?’ And another painful question that I wouldn’t want to be pine-tarred-and-feathered for asking at the time was: ‘have we really beaten anybody decent in the last 3 weeks?’ All of those conference teams were currently below us in the standings, with Wofford (eventual surprise tournament champion) and Davidson scrapping the bottom of the barrel. The (A-Sun) Panthers of Georgia State were not even “batting” .500. True, it was a good thing no matter how you slice it (considering the slump we were in), to be back in the middle of the SoCon pack. But what are Eagle fans going to be doing on May 27th (?) I asked myself at the time. Will we be reading from the athletic website that, once again, the 2007 baseball team “…closes out another season with a final loss in the conference tournament”? Well, we all know what happened by now. Ironically, the team that GSU knocked out of the SoCon tournament (Western) had a better chance of winning their NCAA regional (earning an at-large bid with a solid record) than the eventual surprise SoCon tourney champion (Wofford). This was the same Wofford team that had been scrapping the barrel in recent weeks and entered the Southern Conference tournament as a #9 seed. But enough about Wofford’s blip-on-the-radar-screen NCAA tournament appearance, which ended at the hands of a slew of ‘Carolina’s’ in their Columbia regional. It's been 5 years and 6 seasons since the Georgia Southern baseball team won the league title and entered the elite fold of the NCAA tournament field. Like the sweep of Georgia Tech in February, that’s another distant memory. By all accounts, the 2007 Eagles should have had an overall and conference record very similar to the College of Charleston or Western Carolina; the top two clubs in the Southern Conference standings by years’ end. But despite the high hopes in January for a stellar season, and contention for a SoCon season and/or tourney championship --- followed by an NCAA Regional ---once again, none of those things came to fruition. Baseball prognosis: I believe that GSU has the right man for the job in Coach Rodney Hennon. While the Eagles now play in a state-of-the-art facility (with the major renovations to J.I. Clements graciously funded in large part by Coach Hennon's father), that benefit has yet to become more than a question mark for the now experienced and talented team. The current state of the program appears to have the right personnel from solid recruiting and talent, and a great facility. It certainly has some decent tradition and history with 2 trips to Omaha, one NAIA title in ’62, and several tournament appearances in years past. But until that “history” once again translates into consistent play resulting in consistent wins over quality opponents---and a resurgence of trips to the NCAA tournament --- Georgia Southern is no longer the SoCon bruiser of the ballpark. New force to be reckoned with on the Diamond: (tie) College of Charleston & Western Carolina. Basketball While Georgia Southern has never enjoyed a particularly rich history of hardwood prowess as a division 1 basketball team, TAAC (now known as the Atlantic Sun conference) or Southern Conference, they have had their moments. Three times they have gone to the NCAA’s---all of those when the Eagles played in the TAAC, and they have made some noise in the Southern conference over the years. But it’s been a long, long time. It seems that the program momentum that was really building in the late 80’s died pretty quickly once the 90’s began. There are elements to that equation that I will not get into, but Eagle basketball clearly took a few steps backwards during the early 90’s (with the exception of the 1992 tournament year). An NCAA infraction occurred in the program, coach Kearns and the school parted ways, followed by a hiring blunder with Greg Polinsky. Jeff Price has been on board ever since, and has created a pretty solid program with some decent success through the years. In its current state, facilities are the big issue. Hanner field house is very “NAIA” for a home-court of a large, state-funded D-1 school in this day and age. That’s a problem on many levels---recruiting being one of the biggest. It shows on television too. If this issue is not quickly addressed it could perpetuate years of mediocrity, beginning in the near future. While the program is not even a year and a half removed from the #1 seed of the ’06 conference tournament, that regular season achievement has long been forgotten, due to their poor showing in a ‘one and done’ quarterfinal tournament upset to #8 seed Appalachian State. The team was all but a no-show against Charlotte in the NIT that soon followed. Losing Elton Nesbitt hurt when the curtain closed on that season, but there were still high expectations for the next year, being this past one. His loss was eventually felt much more than anticipated. What played out was a sub-par '06-'07 campaign from coach Price's squad ---one expected to be in the hunt for an NCAA tournament berth. The season ended in a quarterfinal loss in early March and a losing record---overall and in conference. It’s not that these guys aren’t capable of playing D-1 basketball---just probably not for Georgia Tech…or even Georgia for that matter. {But neither are most players in the Southern Conference.} As for Georgia Southern, their current reality/quandary could be summed up in this scenario: Let’s say a really talented kid out of Beaufort is prized by both GSU and College of Charleston (among other mid-major D-1 schools largely in the Southeast). We’ll say some of his other comparable offers are from Florida A &M, Troy, Samford, UAB, East Tennessee State, Central Florida, and South Carolina State. And this 6-2 shooting guard has made it clear that he is down to these two Southern Conference programs---as the marquee D-1 schools showed only interest but no scholarship commitment. He has no ties to either of the schools... their past achievements or lack thereof. The academics are fairly ‘even’ to him, he is not partial to playing in or out of his home state, and it matters not to him that one has a football program and the other does not. …After a very close ‘race’… in the end, he chooses C of C because of the basketball environment and facilities he will enjoy in his 4 years with the program. Not because Bobby C. ‘sold’ him better than Jeff P. did. But because the overall look, feel, and, in his evaluation, quality facilities and home-court atmosphere of Cougars basketball sold him. {I am using this school, conference foe though it is, in a ‘for instance’ example only.} Facilities are a recruiting edge that GSU lacks. Basketball Prognosis: Despite the recent setbacks, I believe that GSU has the right man for the job, but not by leaps and bounds. Jeff Price is a solid recruiter and good coach who has collected a pretty talented group of players with decent size who can defend, play hard, fast, smart, and unselfishly. They have some shooters too. Whether they can consistently ‘hang’ with the best of the Southern Conference is a question worth asking. Making more free throws would certainly help! The big problem for the GSU squad is that they are part of a program with a glaring need for a new gym and facilities situation. I am not blaming their losses on facilities. And the current players on the present roster certainly need to ‘step up’ and be tough, tenacious, execute, improve from the foul line, and take ownership for the things they are in control of on the court. But every solid basketball program has to continually recruit solid players who can get the job done in order to survive and stay solid, much less thrive. Yes, it’s an uphill battle in the world of a million D-1 programs---where most of the division is comprised of mid-majors schools. Concerning the Eagles head coach, things are not quite as clear. Whether GSU and the majority of its fans currently value Coach Price in the same way that they did in seasons past is an unknown, because everyone has their own opinion on the matter, and the opinions vary widely. It is my belief that Jeff Price is not the primary concern, as much as Hanner Field house and its antiquity, facilities, and community college size and feel should be. Coach Price and his assistants ultimately can only “do so much”. Eventually (when a prospect finally steps onto the university grounds) the campus and all it has to offer the player will have to do the recruiting. The gym and facilities --- where he will call ‘home’ for much of his time at GSU or any school--- will have to stand on it’s own merits. If it’s not up to par with other (similar caliber) gyms, locker rooms, dorms, meeting rooms, and training areas, then he’s likely going to look for greener pastures…if he’s a solid, coveted player. While it would not be accurate to mention basketball in the same breath as the other two sports (in terms of the Eagles being a historically definitive “conference bully” on the hardwood), the men’s team has had a strong reputation in the 80’s, and again over the past few years. It is a reputation that is slowly, in my estimation, starting to fade. However, “If you build it, they will come”…as a movie once stated about a dream ballpark in a field. That “they”, much like the movie, is primarily referring to the kind of talented ball-player that Georgia Southern could attract (the hypothetical kid out of Beaufort). Once the student-athlete sees what has been built, and that a serious athletic investment is being made in more than just football, they are compelled to sign on the dotted line, and eventually become part of a new core of talent that leads the Eagles back to the NCAA’s on a fairly regular basis. {Our current status as a tournament-time ‘folder’ is not helping the cause either.} A new breed of recruits coming on board as a result of a new and dynamic D-1 facility, and raucous home crowd environment to add to the mix, could and should put us over that hump. Undisputed head-of-the-class for Southern Conference basketball: Davidson.
Football * This article was written before the month of August. Therefore, the following section on GSU football was opined before the recent, mid-August mandate by the NCAA’s Division I Board of Directors (of which Bruce Grube is a part). This mandate declared that there would be a halt to any and all institutions who are considering moving into the football FBS (1-A) classification. Interestingly, Dr. Grube was the sole vote of the 18 member Presidents/Chancellors board that was against this moratorium. This begins immediately and lasts for a 4 year period. Western Kentucky (who made their decision to move up roughly a year ago) would be exempt from this mandate. Read on, with this recent announcement in mind… For more than 25 brief yet historical years, one word describes Georgia Southern football. It has three letters, and is synonymous with ‘win’. Erk. Now, to the untrained ear that may sound silly: Erk equals = win. But to those who know GSU football it sounds perfectly clear. In the mid 80’s, back in the glory days of Georgia Southern’s humble beginnings, the most famous bald eagle the peach state has ever known started winning game after game ‘just one more time’. The late Coach Erk Russell quickly became our own legendary 1-AA version of what Bear Bryant was and is to Alabama. The Georgia Bulldog nation even has a deep sense of pride and appreciation for their former defensive coordinator---as if he had been a highly successful head coach for UGA once upon a time. That’s the kind of respect and admiration that Erk held in the state of Georgia---with Bulldogs and Eagles alike, but especially with Eagles. Even more amazing is that Erk Russell amassed three national titles for Georgia Southern College (the school did not gain university status until 1990) between the dawn of the 1980’s and the last waning days of the decade. And there was no Georgia Southern Football before Erk Russell, Bucky Wagoner, and the visionary Dale Lick; former Georgia Southern College president. In the 6 seasons of NCAA sanctioned 1-AA football in the 1980’s, the only years that Coach Russell did NOT win the national title were ’84 (1st year of 1-AA eligibility), ’87 (quarterfinal participant), and ’88 (national runner up). That’s 3 for 6. That’s batting .500 in the championship department. Not too shabby. And you have to play your way to the title game in this league. You don’t get ‘voted through’. The memorable titles of ’85 and ’86 were almost more than the young Big Blue football nation could stand. Tracy Ham (recent inductee to the college football Hall of Fame) was our electric and supremely talented man under center---guiding the “hambone” offense to a balanced, air and ground assault that kept fans on the edge of their seat. It was almost surreal. Georgia Southern football was so new and yet so successful and “championship pride” all at the same time. The whole GSU community had eagle bumps all up and down our body. Erk’s Eagles were the story of the Peach State in the mid 80’s. Much to the dismay of the ever-expanding Eagle fan base, Erk hung it up after the 1989 national championship season and a perfect 15-0 record. The following year, the Eagles won yet another title. {While Erk was merely a school ‘cheerleader’ and sideline-supporter at this point, most followers of the program credit this title to him, more or less, since nearly all of these players were his the year before, and the system was the same. Coach Tim Stowers never won another title, or even got us back to the title game after 1990.} Erk is our Bear Bryant. And even more so, our starting place for the very football program itself. There was Alabama football before Coach Bear Bryant. There was not even a football before Coach Russell. He was the man who built it…and we came. Erk Russell put Georgia Southern College on the map. And he probably had more to do with us becoming Georgia Southern University than any of us will ever really know. The (original) ‘old ball coach’ coached his last game over 17 years ago. And he passed away, sadly, at the ripe old age of 80 while driving on a Friday morning in Statesboro, the day before the first football game of the 2006 season. He will be sorely missed. But his presence, memory, and fingerprints will forever be felt upon GSU football and the university as a whole. Paul Johnson picked up nicely where Erk left off…sort of. It took us roughly another decade to get to the title game, with some futility in the early and mid-90’s, and the eventual release of Tim Stowers, before (former O.C.) Coach Johnson entered back into the picture---now as head coach. It didn’t take long for Paul Johnson to re-instill the old Eagle pride and get GSU back to playing run-it-down-your-throat, hard-nosed football. After a heartbreaking title game loss to UMass in 1998, eventually the prominence was restored in 1999 with Adrian Peterson wreaking havoc on opposing defenders and leading the Eagles to the title in a “we won’t be denied” fashion. A.P. led the charge again in 2000 for a nice encore to carry his team to the winner’s circle again for our third back-to-back set of national titles. No other team in (the now) FCS has won more than 4 national titles. Georgia Southern owns 6. But there’s plenty of room on the flagpole for more, and it’s been far too long since we’ve made a deep run into the playoffs. Let’s shift gears for a moment to the ‘idea’ of Georgia Southern Football. Not the records, the past coaches, the stats, the former players, the color scheme, the championship teams, the coach who quit on us…none of that. What I mean is that part of the makeup of GSU football that we form in our mind. Over the years, people have asked me where I went to school. It would go something like this: “I went to Georgia Southern” “…oh yea, where is that, Valdosta? You guys have a real good division II football team down there, right? …the Golden Eagles or something like that?” {I kid you not, I had this very conversation last night!} For every Eagle fan, alumni or not, 7 out of 10 of you have had a conversation something like that (at one time or another) with somebody not from Georgia…maybe they even were from Georgia! I don’t know about you, but that ‘idea’ of GSU football still bothers me. I know that Erk Russell had an idea that exceeded that small-school view as well. Coach Russell once wrote: “I wasn’t sure what ‘Division One’ meant to [then University President Dale Lick]. But I knew what ‘One’ meant to me - Georgia, Notre Dame, Southern California - all those kind of folks.” Amen, coach. It would seem, after this many years of gridiron success, that the ‘need to explain’ all those things about Georgia Southern and its successful football team would have long since evaporated. But that’s what happens when you stay on a lower plateau and choose to camp there indefinitely. And it’s only compounded by the fact that it’s a big college football world out there in general, no matter what level you play. Arkansas State…our opponent in the ’86 title game, who now plays in that 1-A tier that we’re always explaining that GSU is ‘just a notch below’ is struggling just to get noticed as well. When the average NCAA southern football fan is salivating for the Georgia, Florida, Tennessee, Clemson, Auburn, or South Carolina season to get started, the 1-A (FBS) also-rans and the 1-AA (FCS) programs are trying to make their mark somewhere. Just to get noticed…to get some publicity…to be remembered …just to grow…just to get some recognition… just to have a chance to win. Well, we can all look at the banners and see that we’ve ‘been there, done that’ with Georgia Southern in the 1-AA world of college football. Got 6 t-shirts to prove it, as the saying goes. But is that all there is to GSU football? Seeing how many more of those FCS flags we can hang from the pole at Paulson Stadium? It certainly is a solid goal, and as we’ve seen, it’s getting harder and harder to get back there. But consider this: If the birth of the program had gotten off to a rough, long, drawn-out start many years ago, and we only had, say, 1, maybe 2 national titles, spread out over several years of play, I could understand ‘settling’. But as we all know, our infancy was quickly followed by a string of success and dominance that is rare in the sports world for a program that was non-existent just a few years before. Has Georgia Southern settled? Is there any 1-A (FBS) pulse in the football program in Statesboro? Does anyone besides me dream that maybe, just maybe, Conference USA (somewhat realistic, I think), or even the Big East (less realistic, but more ideal) would ever give GSU the time of day and ‘invite’ us into their conference to compete in all sports, and, in football, at the FBS level? Am I the only one who has such ‘visions of sugar plums’ dancing in my head?? But the Middle Tennessee State’s of the world (0 national titles) *---they thought they had one coming to them in ’85, but were denied by Eagle championship team #1 --- saw it with my own eyes, many moons ago ---* and now the Western Kentucky’s of the world (1 title…ouch) are not settling. MTSU has moved on, and WKU is in the process. Crazy? Maybe. WKU is much more of a basketball school, and MTSU is always in the shadow of UT, Vanderbilt, and the Tennessee Titans---and actually, WKU is roughly in the same shadow as well, being just north of the border of the Tn/Ky line. The Blue Raiders of Middle Tennessee State finally got into their first bowl game last year. So it can be done. WKU, on the other hand, might be headed for football-futility down the road for their particular program by making such a move…since they currently experience a nominal existence. The Hilltoppers will likely join MTSU, who struggles mightily at the gate, in the Sun Belt Conference---which they are already members of in all other sports. Sure, Sun Belt teams are still ‘fodder’ (largely) for the big boys to feast upon in pre-conference September away games in monstrous stadiums. But these guys are getting into the ring. And you have to tip your hat to these institutions for giving it the “old college try”! Say what you want about the Sun Belt, but it is a division 1-A conference. I, for one, agree with Mr. Baker’s sentiments concerning the Sun Belt, from his monthly website update from a year or more ago. I think that GSU would be making a mistake to join that sub-par conference. Now, I don’t know where Sam Baker is on this issue of expansion and moving into the FBS (1-A) level of play, but it needs to come back to the surface. We have a very successful football history---far more than the vast majority of schools in the nation between 1982 and today, for that matter. And we have a ‘blood line’ in us that should spur us onward into contention for greater things in stronger conferences against higher profile schools than the SoCon schools we are members with currently. Or even those in the Sun Belt---1-A though they be. Is it really pompous to say such things? I think it’s very legitimate to ask Troy State or South Florida “how many 1-AA titles do you own”? 0? Then you guys are no better than we are just because you (Troy) joined the Sun Belt and now play 1-A ball. …And the University of South Florida was given a gift to be a part of the Big East Conference. That kind of stuff gets my GSU jealousy-juices flowing. Big student population at USF. And Tampa-St. Pete is a strong, rich market. But they had NO football at their school prior to the mid-90’s! None. In many ways, GSU should have taken the Bulls’ place in history in the pursuit of 1-A glory. USF barely had their training wheels on before they were ‘pitching them to the sidewalk’ and taking on the big boys! Look where both schools are now. USF, a Big East member, won a bowl game last season, and is expected to have another solid season. GSU spent the year in FCS Purgatory, and we open our 2007 season in a few weeks against mighty West Georgia… No, I am not going to be so ludicrous as to think that the SEC or ACC is just waiting for us to expand Paulson, make the 1-A move, so they can then invite us in with open, waiting arms. Those conferences are “all filled up”, and a greater issue at hand would be something called a reality check. …and no, Vanderbilt is not going to “switch with us”! But what about Paulson? It used to take about 32,000 seats, thereabouts, to qualify to play at the 1-A level. Now you can just go 1-A for “free”…kind of. OK, it still costs money. But as Alex Pellegrino recently pointed out in an article in the Statesboro Herald, making ‘the move’ is not nearly as difficult and costly as it used to be. No stadium expansion is required any longer. I have a hunch that GSU already averages and probably exceeds the 15,000 home-attendance requirement to make the move. MTSU took that risk about 6 or 7 years back, and at that time stadium expansion, and the financial strain of the steel and mortar was still required. And they have BIG entertainment-dollar competition…stiff competition just down the road. {Without naming the tons of quality musical acts constantly performing in Nashville and middle Tennessee, the Titans, NHL Predators, and Vanderbilt are all very nearby sports competition dollars.} And yes, MTSU is struggling. GSU, on the other hand, does not have much competition within many a country mile, and they have history behind them. Neither of which Middle or Western have going for them. Scenario: If somebody living in Bowling Green, Kentucky really wants to see some solid, live college football action on a fall Saturday, and they don’t want to spend an arm and a leg, or all day driving to get there and back, will they: A) opt for a 5 to 10 minute drive from their house to see WKU take on the Akron Zips in a battle for the ages? …or B) Head down I-65 South for about an hour and 10 minutes, and arrive at the Vanderbilt campus with 45 minutes to spare before the kickoff of Vandy vs. Georgia, for just a little more cost?? {It’s fairly easy to get into Vanderbilt games for less than face value, 90% of the time. And they are rarely if ever sold out. Trust me.} …ANSWER: option B! SEC action will always win that battle, especially if most other factors are equal, and the threat of not getting in the game is a non-issue. And neither MTSU nor Western (who are both firmly aware of this reality) are flinching one bit about moving forward. MTSU of course has already done so…this is their football division and they are sticking to it, so to speak. Western may be signing a death warrant, but they have relatively little to lose. They already struggle in college football anonymity. GSU needs to find its pulse again, expand Paulson stadium to show we are serious about playing D-1 ball, and wait and see what other, stronger conferences might think of us as we position ourselves for life beyond the 1-AA world. While it is risky, and stadium expansion is no longer required to enter the FBS, if we DON’T build it, they (a solid D-1 conference) WON’T come calling…that much is for sure. If we don’t expand, we are settling for the mediocrity of 1-AA, or even the 1-A Sun Belt for that matter. We should settle for neither. Football Prognosis: Do we currently have the right man for the job? Ask that question a year ago, and there would have been a lot of head scratching. Now we are banging our heads on the counter. Ask that question today, and I think that most of us would give a resounding YES! Chris Hatcher seems to be all about the restoration of Eagle football to the lofty perch it once knew. He’s got my ‘thumbs up’ and he’s never even coached a single game as the GSU head man. That’s the kind of ‘old school’ charm and charisma we need again at Our House. On the player side of things, first, we need to tap into the “Jason Fosters” of our team and utilize every weapon at our disposal in this inaugural “Hatch Attach” campaign. Oddly enough, there is an ‘out with the new, in with the old’ theme going on with Chris Hatcher. He may be the new sheriff in town, but if you aren’t kicking it old-school-style, then you can get back on the bus that brought you to Statesboro. Good for Coach Hatch to send the misfits packing. There needs to be a ‘no tolerance’ policy with his program from Day One on arrests and bad behavior. If we can continue to recruit strong---and this year looks to have been pretty solid, despite the staff only having been a few weeks into the job---and weed out the no-character guys, preferably before we sign them, the future could be bright. Throw in good grades (come on, guys!) and buckling down in the classroom, so as not to get hit again by the NCAA with loss of scholarships down the road, and we may even find ourselves again in contention in the SoCon, sooner than later. But the Southern Conference title and even trips to Chattanooga in December should not be our main focus in the long term. Our immediate focus, yes, but not our ultimate one. That’s the world to other FCS teams, but for Eagles, we should call that tunnel vision. I know it’s a risky thing to expand a stadium with possibly an “all dressed up, but no place to go” (independent) affiliation waiting for you when you get there. But if we stay cozy…if we stay comfortable…if we stay 15,000 to 17,000 strong on home games and no more…if we stay 1-AA…then we have decided already what we will be. A team that never thought it could soar any higher than it already has. And that is not the Georgia Southern Eagle mentality I “grew up with” or was surrounded by on an excited campus in the mid 1980’s. For starters though, we need to find that lost swagger again. That attitude that says “we ARE Georgia Southern, and we are going to knock your block off, old school style”. And get out on the field and do it, while snagging a couple more national titles along the way to FBS transition. Then we can start talking about greener pastures, and taking on the likes of Furman, as a 1-AA tune-up, before our (C-USA…?) conference season gets under way! Wouldn’t that be sweet? You tell me which of these (September) schedule scenarios sounds better to you… GSU Eagle Football – 2011 GSU Eagle Football – 2011 (FBS Conference-USA “1-A” Member*) (FCS Southern Conference “1-AA” member*) 09/01 Texas Tech 09/01 Savannah State 09/08 @ Georgia Tech 09/08 @ Coastal Carolina 09/15 South Carolina St. (FCS) 09/15 Valdosta State (D-II) 09/22 *Memphis 09/22 @ *Elon 09/29 * Southern Miss. … 09/29 *Wofford … Yea…it’s a no-brainer as far as I’m concerned too. And that’s just a hypothetical glimpse at the first month of the season. Hey, if you want to plug in Big East teams in that left column, go for it! I think that’s a bigger stretch, but you never know, they need some more football teams in that conference… In our current 2007 reality, consider: Georgia Southern started this whole football thing from scratch over 25 years ago---with a visionary president, a wide-eyed AD, one football, and a coach for the ages that embraced a dream. A dream that was waiting for him in Statesboro rather than Athens. Erk wanted to be a part of something new, special, and different. He, the school, the administrative leadership, and the team put their ‘all’ into it, and the result was but a mere handful of years that it took to reach the top of the mountain…back to back! Now think how quickly, with that rich history of fast success, Southern can find the lost swagger and the winning ways that have eluded us? The team looks battle-tested and ready. This past fall (known as the Brief & Ugly Campaign of Coach ‘what’s his name’) may have secretly been a blessing in disguise for our boys in uniform. Coach Hatcher---they believe in you, they respect you, and they don’t think that you will abandon them. We know you are ‘in’, and we are thankful. Mr. Baker, are you ‘in’ for the bigger picture as well? Dr. Grube, do you have some of that ‘Dale Lick vision’ residing in you for your school’s athletics department and football program? Do you envision 32,000 or more seats being added to the “prettiest little stadium in America” before the decade is through? The Eagle faithful are hoping so. The college football nation is not so sure who we are anymore. It’s high time to remind them, and our own opponents in the SoCon what Georgia Southern football is all about. Winning. Erk style. Old school style. And doing so with dominance. Making it once again, ‘Southern’s’ Conference. …But for now, we’d better take that tradition-rich Eagle attitude, and the Paulson pride of ‘the house that Erk built’, tuck it in our pocket, and walk with a humble gate. Be proud of being Eagles, but realize that the national prominence and the upper hand we once had is no longer ours, even in the conference we currently play in that we once owned. Have a slice of humble pie. We are no longer feared so much. New bully on the block, and ‘public enemy #1’ in FCS & SoCon football: Appalachian State. Eagle Athletics Prognosis: There is a spirit about Eagle athletics that beckons these three sports programs, and in some cases their facilities and vision, to reach higher and farther than before. The other men’s and women’s teams are giving some solid effort, and it’s starting to show up in the win column. They will only get better, and follow suit, as football, baseball, and basketball blaze the trail of success, or mediocrity, for the university. {Let’s not even mention the ‘f’ word.} …If not, these other men’s and women’s programs will make their own mark regardless. But the challenge will not be quite as stiff if we find our winning ways--- our ‘fear factor’--- again in these three high-profile men’s sports. Generally speaking, they…one or more… are the catalyst and backbone of any schools’ overall success in its other sports teams. Winning has a way of producing confidence and ‘bleeding’ over from program to program. Mediocrity and even failure (there, I said it) have a way of becoming contagious too. The time is now, and the situation is fast approaching critical. We have three short athletic seasons (’07-’08, ’08-’09, ’09-’10) to make adjustments, and be successful in football, baseball, and basketball so as to ‘make good’ on a decade that is quickly coming to a close. Or it will be a long “teens” decade to follow, and perhaps even a century of oblivion that forgets about the past power and glory of the Georgia Southern Eagles all together. The Army Cadets of old are but a distant memory as a dominant team from the mid-twentieth century. Admittedly, that institution--West Point--has bigger fish to fry, and that is to be respected and taken into consideration concerning their athletic decline. Georgia Southern University, on the other hand, was meant to ‘fly high’ athletically. In the same confident, dominant, and fearless spirit that eagles were born to do. We are Eagles too. And that beckons us to boldly and pro-actively take newer and greater challenges head on, as the unknown horizon calls us to venture into it, unflinching---and conquer it like the great Georgia Southern bald Eagle did---“just one more time”. We are ready to soar again. Scott Moore Class of 1987 Nashville, Tennessee. (via email) Letters to the Editor is a new feature provided by TSCsports.com. Submission of "letters to the editor" implies the right to edit (for clarity or space) and/or to publish all or in part. Please include your name, address, daytime phone number, and e-mail address. Only your name and hometown will be posted for public consumption. |